Imagine...just imagine finding a wallet file somewhere that points to that address and has the coins intact?

Just think of all the potential suicides that would have resulted from these now catastrophic losses. Wow

The poor guys who lost 7000+ and 27000 bitcoins...I wonder what they would be feeling right now if they haven't already killed themselves?

If it were me, I'd still be around. I'm a tough guy. I've been through a LOT of hard shit - parents divorced when I was 9, I was sexually assaulted that same year, lost my mother to suicide 3 years later, endured years of school bullying, lost half of my sexual function from a bike riding accident, and when I was 23 my girlfriend who I was planning to marry had an abortion because her mother didn't want her to have the baby out of wedlock.

So, at the end of the day - it's only money. If I had $8M or even $30M today I doubt I would ever recover the emotional losses that I have incurred. Remember, Kurt Cobain had millions and guess what he did in spite of his immense material wealth? He blew his brains out...

But damned if there wouldn't be some guys who would decide to enter the eternal void due to insurmountable grief. Ouch. What did I say? Ouch! Let me say that or more time...OUCH!!!!!!!

Would it not be possible to take a sum of stale coins - for example all those not moved since end 2010 and then over time learn what fraction of those came alive later. Doing that over a period might suggest what is lost and what fraction is normally forced back into the open after such a long time.

It's a nice idea in theory, but would ruin the long-term storage possibilities of Bitcoin. People want to print out (or otherwise record) a paper wallet and know that it will be good 1 year, 10 years, and 100 years from now.

It's a nice idea in theory, but would ruin the long-term storage possibilities of Bitcoin. People want to print out (or otherwise record) a paper wallet and know that it will be good 1 year, 10 years, and 100 years from now.

I'm not suggesting a change!.. I'm suggesting there is no exact measure but alluding to that human's on average behave in a stable manner, so the fraction tempted or finding themselves in long-term store relative to coins that are lost, might be a relatively stable fraction.. bit like a half-life; you might be able to determine what is cold and what is just dormant from the half-life of those that come alive after a time.

It's a nice idea in theory, but would ruin the long-term storage possibilities of Bitcoin. People want to print out (or otherwise record) a paper wallet and know that it will be good 1 year, 10 years, and 100 years from now.

I'm not suggesting a change!.. I'm suggesting there is no exact measure but alluding to that human's on average behave in a stable manner, so the fraction tempted or finding themselves in long-term store relative to coins that are lost, might be a relatively stable fraction.. bit like a half-life; you might be able to determine what is cold and what is just dormant from the half-life of those that come alive after a time.

Sorry - I am so used to reading that particular suggestion that I automatically jumped to the same conclusion reading yours!

Yes, that would be an interesting analysis as well. It is most certainly doable.

Yes, that would be an interesting analysis as well. It is most certainly doable.

While it's doable, it's also very dangerous to those holding long-term bitcoin savings. What happens, for example, if I print out a bitcoin wallet, keep the private keys and public keys intact on a piece of paper, archive it in a safe, print multiple copies in different locations, in addition to keeping a dozen copies of a wallet file, and then 10 years later I want to redeem my bitcoin because it is worth millions of dollars. I load up a wallet so I can transfer them to an exchange...BUT the coins are gone. The blockchain had since been "audited and edited" and my bitcoin addresses, since they hadn't moved in 10 years, have been removed and the bitcoin re-minted to the miners.

Ouch, that would be a very painful surprise.

I think it's much better to just keep a log of all the known losses that are confirmed as absolutely unrecoverable, and then re-mint those bitcoins to the miners after 2 years since the loss, to avoid them being unspendable.

But one point to remember is that lost bitcoin makes bitcoin even more valuable. If there are 1,000,000 bitcoins that are unspendable and out of circulation because of data losses, lost paper wallets, lost digital wallets, sent to non-functional address, etc, then the real number of available bitcoin will be probably less than 20,000,000. So, that would raise the price due to the greater scarcity.

Yes, that would be an interesting analysis as well. It is most certainly doable.

While it's doable, it's also very dangerous to those holding long-term bitcoin savings. What happens, for example, if I print out a bitcoin wallet, keep the private keys and public keys intact on a piece of paper, archive it in a safe, print multiple copies in different locations, in addition to keeping a dozen copies of a wallet file, and then 10 years later I want to redeem my bitcoin because it is worth millions of dollars. I load up a wallet so I can transfer them to an exchange...BUT the coins are gone. The blockchain had since been "audited and edited" and my bitcoin addresses, since they hadn't moved in 10 years, have been removed and the bitcoin re-minted to the miners.

Ouch, that would be a very painful surprise.

I think it's much better to just keep a log of all the known losses that are confirmed as absolutely unrecoverable, and then re-mint those bitcoins to the miners after 2 years since the loss, to avoid them being unspendable.

But one point to remember is that lost bitcoin makes bitcoin even more valuable. If there are 1,000,000 bitcoins that are unspendable and out of circulation because of data losses, lost paper wallets, lost digital wallets, sent to non-functional address, etc, then the real number of available bitcoin will be probably less than 20,000,000. So, that would raise the price due to the greater scarcity.

Let's say that bitcoin becomes mainstream like we all hope it will, and many years from now a large portion of bitcoins have been lost due to lost computers or destroyed servers. If there are only 5 or 10 Million bitcoin that still exist is there any way there could be more bitcoin produced, or is it absolutely built into the bitcoin architecture that the 21 Million number cannot be tampered with? Would it simply be easier just to make due with the bitcoin still left in circulation and let the market determine the new value of a bitcoin?

Yes, that would be an interesting analysis as well. It is most certainly doable.

While it's doable, it's also very dangerous to those holding long-term bitcoin savings. What happens, for example, if I print out a bitcoin wallet, keep the private keys and public keys intact on a piece of paper, archive it in a safe, print multiple copies in different locations, in addition to keeping a dozen copies of a wallet file, and then 10 years later I want to redeem my bitcoin because it is worth millions of dollars. I load up a wallet so I can transfer them to an exchange...BUT the coins are gone. The blockchain had since been "audited and edited" and my bitcoin addresses, since they hadn't moved in 10 years, have been removed and the bitcoin re-minted to the miners.

Ouch, that would be a very painful surprise.

I think it's much better to just keep a log of all the known losses that are confirmed as absolutely unrecoverable, and then re-mint those bitcoins to the miners after 2 years since the loss, to avoid them being unspendable.

But one point to remember is that lost bitcoin makes bitcoin even more valuable. If there are 1,000,000 bitcoins that are unspendable and out of circulation because of data losses, lost paper wallets, lost digital wallets, sent to non-functional address, etc, then the real number of available bitcoin will be probably less than 20,000,000. So, that would raise the price due to the greater scarcity.

Satoshi addressed this on June 21, 2010, 12:48:26 PM by saying:

"Lost coins only make everyone else's coins worth slightly more. Think of it as a donation to everyone."

Not sure if this is still ongoing. I have lost 55 BTC that will never again be part of someones wealth.

Are you sure your "lost" 55 BTC are truely lost in the terms of the OP? I'm asking because your signature speaks of lost coins due to a compromised mining pool. Have your coins been stolen or has someone lost control of your coins because the associated private key(s) are gone forever and there is definitely no way to recover them?

It's important to remember that Bitcoins are never truely lost or destroyed or deleted in a technical sense. All you loose is the control to spend them should you ever loose the last copy of the private key of your various bitcoin addresses that hold some coins. Every minted Bitcoins lives happily in the blockchain. The question is: who has the private key necessary to spend them?

I just clicked back through the chain until I saw a 9000 -> 8999 + 1 transaction around the right date.

But he could have bought a few more, because at that time they were pretty cheap. Still, a pretty nasty loss at the time. That was in 2010, if my memory of this thread serves me correctly.In 2010 bitcoins were trading for cents. For about $100, maybe $200 at most, he could have bought another 10,000 BTC.

But if it were today, that would be just so unbelievably heartbreaking.

Wish I'd known about bitcoin back in 2010, I'd have bought about 50,000-100,000 quite easily, for around $2000. Or...even better...in 2009 I would have been solo mining with Satoshi et al, and pulling in 1000s and 1000s of bitcoins without any trouble since it was just so easy to mine them back then. I spoke to one kid in America who pulled in about 6000 BTC in about 2-3 weeks back in 1st quarter 2009.